March 15, 2013

Drones are a triple threat to Muslim women. They murder the women themselves (an estimated 411-884 to date), they leave them destitute by slaughtering their male breadwinners, and they traumatize them, leaving them afraid to aid their neighbors, gather in groups, or send their children to school:

“By [U.S. State Dept. spokeswoman Victoria Nuland’s] definition, every drone assassination carried out by the Bush and Obama administrations has been terrorism, as have the frequent tactics of bombing or ambushing insurgents at home, in both Iraq and Afghanistan”:

With tension increased by the newly discovered natural offshore natural gas deposits, one analyst suggests the way to a resolution is for the leaders of the two parts of Cypress “to meet … informally at a social gathering” to be followed by “talks aimed at reuniting the country while safeguarding the Turkish Cypriot minority and sharing gas deposits”:

“The CIA’s claim that it could neither confirm nor deny whether it has any drone records was inadequate, because the government, including Barack Obama himself, has clearly acknowledged a drone programme, the court said”:

“If St. Francis’ love for all of God’s creation, animals, plants, rivers and mountains is alive and with us today, just like his ascetic mission of poverty, then so is his bold peacemaking with the Muslim world. This is a mission worthy of his name, and one can only hope that the current Pope Francis heeds this call” — Daniel Tutt, Interfaith Activist:

‘Ben Emmerson, the U.N. special rapporteur on human rights and counter-terrorism, said the Pakistani government made clear to him that it does not consent to the strikes — a position that has been disputed by U.S. officials';

Only $200 million of the $85 billion cuts to the 2013 budget comes out of Israels multi-billion dollar foreign aid grants, but Israel-firsters don’t see why they should suffer just because the U.S. economic problems and demand “a status enjoyed by no other nation which will presumably save Israel’s aid from the Budget Control Act axe” …

Mixed motives behind their call fore an election boycott, a failure to put forward its own positive alternative program, organizational incompetence, and disunity are among the reasons analysts suggest for the opposition’s utter failure to capitalize on the growing dissatisfaction with the FJP’s performance in office: